“Have you slept with Jean Paul?”
The brass candelabra narrowly missed my head. It whistled as it flew by and smashed a priceless lamp on a side table.
“I will not grace that with an answer,” she yelled as she picked up something shiny and cocked her arm back.
“You already did,” I retorted angrily.
“I most certainly did not.”
The shiny piece exploded into a million little shards it hit the wall mere inches from my face. Even though I was ready to go ballistic at the thought of Raquel and Jean Paul, I realized how much I was enjoying our exchange of old. At least we weren’t destroying someone else’s home this time.
“Just tell me it’s over,” I said in what I thought was a reasonable tone.
“Do you really think I would have mated with you if I was involved with someone else?” she asked in a tone so quiet I got scared for my undead life.
“Well… I didn’t say you were sleeping with him now. I meant… like ever.”
“Your regard for my morals is sadly lacking and makes me wonder about yours,” she hissed.
“You still haven’t answered the question,” I challenged, fairly sure I should stop while I was still alive. However, my inner alpha-hole had a mind of his own and wouldn’t be denied. My damn mouth kept moving as if I was possessed by the Devil. If only I had that as my excuse.
“Get this through your thick and stupid skull before I break it in half,” she stated, incensed. “My sexual past is not your concern. You will never ask me that question again.”
“It’s a legit question,” Jean Paul commented calmly from the doorway. “I’m fine if you want to tell him the truth.”
“He doesn’t deserve the truth,” Raquel spat and pulled a short dagger from her inner thigh.
Seeing him standing so comfortably in her home was almost my undoing. I knew this impasse was my fault entirely. Goddamn it, messy was going to be a way of life for us if I made it through the next few minutes. My mate and a sharp dagger didn’t bode well for me.
“No,” I said with a decisiveness that belied how I actually felt. “Raquel is right. It’s not my business. Not now—not ever. Although if you ever even think about her like that again, I’ll kill you.”
It was the best I could do under the circumstances. I was possessive and greedy and wanted every part of Raquel to myself, but if I didn’t cave a little it would be a brutal uphill battle to build a future together. I was smart enough to know that. The last two hundred years I’d been only half-alive without her. I would not fuck it up by being jealous over something in her past. I probably had more conquests than she did anyway.
Their laughter caught me off guard. I watched with my fists balled at my sides. Jean Paul took his place on the couch beside my mate as if he belonged there. Raquel’s giggle floated across the room like music and simply infuriated me.
It dawned on me that I was being played, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out how.
“It’s really not nice to toy with him like this,” Jean Paul told her in his fucking debonair French accent. “He will find a way to repay you.”
“Ugggghhhh,” Raquel grunted as she watched me warily. “I don’t like his tone or his insinuations.”
“Hmmm…” Jean Paul stroked his chin and feigned deep thought.
I seriously wanted to rip his head off.
“His tone is that of a newly mated Vampyre,” he assured Raquel. “And I would surmise if the tables were turned, you would have been a Hell of a lot more unpleasant.”
“That’s not true,” she snapped and punched his arm. “Take that back right now.”
His laughter and way with her held a familiar ring to it. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but my fists slowly unclenched.
“Raquel, the poor man is suffering and so close to removing my head I’m getting a bit nervous. If you don’t tell him, I will.”
“Fine,” she groused. “I’ll tell him. But Heathcliff, you’ve lost your panty privileges for a month.”
“That’s just mean,” Jean Paul muttered under his breath.
I couldn’t have agreed more.
“There is no way Jean Paul would have revealed my secret to Vlad or anyone else,” Raquel started and then paused to make my Hell last a bit longer.
“Raquel,” Jean Paul prodded her on with an eye roll. “Put the poor man out of his misery.”
She huffed and placed a kiss on Jean Paul’s head. The very same head I was going to remove in five seconds if someone didn’t enlighten me.
“I raised him basically from birth and turned him when he came of age,” she told me, staring me down and daring me to say something.
“Holy Hell, Raquel. You are so mean,” Jean Paul coughed out on a laugh.
“Well, it’s true,” she shot back gleefully.
“Yes, but...” he said hesitantly.
“Wait. That sounds a little, ummm…” I stuttered.
“Sounds a little what?” she demanded as she crossed her arms over her chest and waited.
Goddamn it, if her position didn’t give me a better shot of her cleavage. I closed my eyes and willed my dick to stay calm.
“Ummm… weird?” I said unable to come up with something eloquent or literal that wouldn’t end my life.
“Well, it would be weird, gross, disgusting and fucking illegal if I’d slept with him,” she shouted. “But I have never and will never have sex with Jean Paul.”